Squeaky rubber on glass panes alert me to his presence. Older, hispanic, shorter than me, with the left pant-leg noticeably wet, he squeaks clean my windows with quiet resolution. His smile is as hesitant as my own and I feel awkward already. The land lady just drove off in her Lexus, no doubt instilling instructions with him before she left. His hands are hard working ones, ones that I respect, but I don’t know how to tell him. I’m thankful that he’s cleaning my windows, though I know it’s not out of the goodness of his heart; I know he’s getting paid.
Still, I have a lot of extra brownies in my kitchen and doesn’t the window washer like brownies as much as the preacher or the bus driver or the senator or the financial planner or even the man who isn’t very nice to his family? And why can’t I bring myself to unlock the glass door and give him one? Would it interrupt his otherwise pleasant internal rumination? Would I be annoying? Would I cause a floodlight to shine upon an unpleasant recognition of our differences? Does he even give a ____ ?
There’s a distance between Creator and created reflected in the barriers (necessary and unnecessary) that govern human relations. I’m not talking about his job or his language or his ethnicity. Something is wrong with the world and in some acutely inscrutable way each moment reflects that. Sometimes, I feel it deeply. And I wish heaven were here. I wish the Kingdom of God would come more on earth as it is in heaven, and I wish it would come through me.
I wish I had given him a brownie.
Heck, I wish I had given my land lady a brownie too.
Still, I have a lot of extra brownies in my kitchen and doesn’t the window washer like brownies as much as the preacher or the bus driver or the senator or the financial planner or even the man who isn’t very nice to his family? And why can’t I bring myself to unlock the glass door and give him one? Would it interrupt his otherwise pleasant internal rumination? Would I be annoying? Would I cause a floodlight to shine upon an unpleasant recognition of our differences? Does he even give a ____ ?
There’s a distance between Creator and created reflected in the barriers (necessary and unnecessary) that govern human relations. I’m not talking about his job or his language or his ethnicity. Something is wrong with the world and in some acutely inscrutable way each moment reflects that. Sometimes, I feel it deeply. And I wish heaven were here. I wish the Kingdom of God would come more on earth as it is in heaven, and I wish it would come through me.
I wish I had given him a brownie.
Heck, I wish I had given my land lady a brownie too.
2 comments:
Great insight, and so very true.
What a good post.
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